Physics Division
The FNPB Collaboration
This is the home page of the FNPB Users' Group. Here is a link to our current mailing list.
We are interested in the
opportunities to make fundamental neutron physics measurements at the
Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) and
are constructing a facility on one of the SNS flightpaths which views
a cold coupled moderator. In SNS parlance we are known as an
Instrument Development Team (IDT).
The current membership of the FNPB User's Group / IDT Executive Committee is:
Read this to learn how to become a member.
User News
The FNPB will be operated as a user facility by the Oak Ridge Physics
Division for the SNS. User Guidelines are available here. Experiment selection will be
proposal-driven and peer reviewed by a Proposal Review Advisory
Committee (PRAC).
The PRAC has recently been empanelled by the Oak
Ridge Physics Division with the following initial membership:
- Bob Tribble, Chair
- Brad Fillipone
- Jeff Nico
- Mike Ramsey-Musolf
- Albert Steyerl
- Fred Weidtfeldt
The first call for proposals was recently sent out.
The first PRAC meeting will be held sometime in late summer 2005.
There will be an FNPB Users Meeting at the APS05 conference in
Tampa which will be an opportunity to discuss issues such as proposal
submission, facility operations, etc. The meeting will be held from 8-9:30 pm, on Sunday, April 17th, in the Florida Salon II meeting room.
Project Status
The construction of a fundamental neutron physics facility to take
advantage of the nuclear, particle and astrophysics opportunities
available at the SNS has received numerous endorsements: by NSAC in
the 2002 long-range plan; by a
subcommittee of the SNS Science Advisory Commitee chaired by John
Peoples (click here); and by NSAC in a
2003 review of the US neutron physics program chair by Bob Trible (click here). The construction project has been proceeding
according to DOE procedures and has recently been granted Critical
Decision 3A, allowing purchase of long leadtime items, namely guide
and shielding near the moderator. Critical Decision 3B, which will
allow full construction start, is expected soon.
The facility will consist of two beamlines: a wide-bandwidth cold
neutron beamline, suitable for experiments that can utilize the entire
available neutron energy spectrum; and an ultra-cold neutron
(UCN) beamline, suitable for experiments that use UCNs generated by a
superthermal process in superfluid helium. The expected start of
operations on the cold neutron beamline is mid-2007; the expected
start of operations on the UCN beamline is early-2010.
Click here to see more details on the project design and status.
Click here to see details about performance simualtions.
Physics Opportunties and Prior Workshops
FNPSNS Workshop (2001)
To initiate a broad collaboration a
Workshop on Fundamental Neutron Physics at the SNS (FNPSNS-2001)
was held at the ORNL Physics Division on September 20 and 21,
2001. We posted the
proceedings of the workshop on the web. At this workshop a
tentative plan was developed for an "Instrument Development
Team" (IDT) to encompass all proposed fundamental neutron physics
studies at the SNS and to meet SNS guidelines .
IDTs provide the mechanism at the SNS by which beamlines that are not
funded by the SNS project are built and operated, and the IDTs also
provide the organizational structure for the construction and
operation of such beamlines.
See Geoff Greene's note on the design
issues distributed in advance of the Workshop, and Frank
Plasil's note summarizing the Workshop
conclusions.
Fundamental Physics with Pulsed Beams (2000)
Fundamental
neutron physics opportunities were considered in depth at the workshop
Fundamental Physics with Pulsed Beams held in June, 2000. The
proceedings from that workshop are published as, "Proceedings of
Fundamental Physics with Pulsed Neutron Beams", FPPNB-2000, World
Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., P.O. Box 128, Farrer BRoad,
Singapore 912805, edited by C. R. Gould, G. L. Greene, F. Plasil and
W. M. Snow (2001).
Links to some experiments that may be carried out at this facility:
